


Luke & Leia

by Mormonhippie



Category: Star Wars
Genre: F/M, Other
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-12-23
Updated: 2018-01-23
Packaged: 2019-02-19 00:55:14
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 9
Words: 12,828
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13112382
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mormonhippie/pseuds/Mormonhippie
Summary: This story is basically Luke and Leia becoming the dynamic duo they were always meant to be, and never got the opportunity to be in cannon. The end of "The Return of the Jedi" always felt like a new start to me; they weren't just celebrating a victory, they were also becoming a family. And while I think there's a lot to explore in that transition, I understand why they never decided to explore it further in books or film: it probably wouldn't be as exciting as the original trilogy. If Star Wars is a Space Opera, what happens afterward would be a Space Soap Opera.This work is inspired by Star Wars Extended Universe/Legends as well as the Cinematic Universe, but mostly it deals with the Original Trilogy, with references to the Prequel Trilogy.





	1. Happy Honeymoon

Leia Organa was angry...er than usual. She was alone in the cockpit of a single pilot ship, floating in dead space, this is NOT how she envisioned spending their honeymoon! 

Not that Han was missing her now. She pushed buttons on the consul in front of her. In the back of her mind, she wondered if Han would expect her to be waiting for him at the suite when he got back, if he would come back...

"Amazing how that man forgets I can navigate, too.” She muttered to no one in particular, “Should you require an escort...” she fumed, imitating a the familiar voice of her golden attendant. She didn't need an escort, she needed....

A blip on the consul lit up red, and a rapidly low, irritating beeping noise. It permeated the close perimeters of the cockpit, but it was music to Leia's ears. Her fingers scrambled over the grid, and it displayed the coordinates she'd been looking for: DS-33.97, 448.5, 66.65

She didn't even bother committing the place name of the planet to memory before she started calculating the hyperspace jump. One of the nice things about her spacecraft, was that it was a reliable with hyperspace travel, even if it wasn't for much else. It took only a few minutes to prime the fuel systems and she was-

Staring at a grey-white and blue planet, her eyes adjusted and she could see turbulant oceans: churning blue and white in massive, aquatic hurricaines. Grey peaks rose above, with her sensors picked up a high atmospheric pressure gradient originating along the sphere's equator. The wind currents along the equatior were probably equally hazardous to the oceans hurricanes and tidal waves. 

“Oh, Luke what have you gotten yourself into now?”


	2. A Joyous Reunion

What Luke had gotten himself into was a deep cavern leading to the heart of a mountain. Oh, and he had a broken his leg, too. But it didn't hurt that bad, at least not that Luke could tell in his present state. The cavern walls were moist, though, and the things growing in them confirmed that this place was definitely not a a sterile atmosphere. The wound was open, so the risk of infection was eminent. None of this was something Luke could bear to bring to the forefront of his mind, which was probably a good thing: it kept him calm, and prevented his body from going into shock. 

Instead, his mind remained focused on goals, not consequences. He began to breath deep, steady breaths and _focus_.

Once he had been able to externalize the pain, he began a slow, crawling accent to the cavern's entrance above. In such a state, though, he had failed to check in with his droid, R2-D2, waiting on the surface. And that was when the distress signal was sent out to Leia Organa, a proviso she'd arranged between herself and the droid ever since Luke had begun acting so peculiar after the Battle of Endor.

Luke knew none of this, so wasn't expecting assistance. In fact, the thought of seeking help hadn't even crossed his mind: this was all just a minor setback. R2 was waiting for him back at the ship, he wasn't alone. And he knew there were small communities of primitives inhabiting the planet where he could seek help, but they mostly lived in the deep valleys where the most severe of the winds couldn't reach, and rarely ventured up the to the summits or the caves. With any luck, he wouldn't even have to leave the planet before finishing his investigation. 

But there were was the other reason he felt like he was not alone, and those he wouldn't willfully bring into the forefront of his mind either. The all of the caverns themselves, at least all that he had seen, seemed natural: borne out of the formation of the planet over millions and millions of years, but then he found purified ore, and ingots. Even now, as he staggered and crawled back to the entrance, he rubbed his fingers against a few scraps of ruined metal even more intricate that looked like...

_No._

He stopped himself from thinking too far beyond what he could see around him, and the task he had in front of him. He wasn't far away from the entrance now, he knew, because he hadn't made very far of a trek in.

He started to hear a noise coming from up ahead. Fear gripped him and he made a move to hide behind a outcropping of rock. From the shadows he saw a figure emerge. It was much taller than the planet's natives, but not much larger than himself. Surely he could overpower the being, even in his injured state. He gripped his lightsaber, listened, reached out with The Force, and waited for the right moment. 

Then he felt something familiar, loosened his grip on the saber, and peaked behind the rock. After his eyes adjusted, he recognized the short, slim, feminine outline of...

“Leia?!” 

So surprised at her inexplicable presence on the remote planet, he didn't even process the look of complete outrage beating into him from her face.

“Leia what are you doing here? Is something wrong?”

“Something wrong?” Leia echoed. Repeating his words in such a severe tone, suddenly he recognized the anger on her face.

“Something wrong?” She repeated again, louder this time, and enunciating, like the words had some deeper meaning he couldn't quite grasp yet.

"No, Luke. Nothing's wrong..."

No, there was something definitely wrong now, her voice had gone all soft but her face was still seething. Like a predator hiding behind a bush, just waiting for the opportunity to pounce.

"You're injured," she indicated his dangling, limp leg "alone, in a whole on a forsaken planet in the middle of no where. With a soon-to-be infected wound," she noticed the blood dripped down his leg "without so much as a medi-pack, and you left without telling anyone where you were going!"

Her voice had rose a couple of octaves and by the end of her rebuke, the severity in her voice was biting.

Luke winced, he was used to Leia being angry, although most of the time the anger was primarily directed at Han. Usually he'd let this sort of anger spell run it's course, but as she opened her mouth again it was clear the verbal onslaught wouldn't be abated. Of course not, Han wasn't there. 

“I wasn't alone.” Luke interrupted, inwardly ashamed at how petulant the words sounded coming out of his mouth. “R2 was with me.” 

“Oh, and it's a good thing he was, too." The words sounded like a threat, "Because if he wasn't you wouldn't just be injured, you'd be dead."


	3. No and No

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Since I'm uploading this on 12/25/17: MERRY CHRISTMAS!!! 
> 
> And a happy new year :)

"Of course you may still die," Leia amended, "but if you do, it will be because I killed you." 

Luke turned a palm up, shrugging, as Leia unpacked some equipment and borrowed some twine from the utility belt he'd brought with him into the cave. With it she began to secure his injured leg, then she gently poured liquid over the open wound and wrapped a bandage around it.

He was at a loss, a part of him was indignant and couldn't fathom how or why Leia had come to be here in the first place. She _shouldn't_ be here, his mind insisted, this was his task alone. And wasn't she supposed to be on her honeymoon anyway?! 

But he also knew his present position wasn't exactly suited to advocate in favor of his own competence. So he remained silent as she worked, and found that the silence between them was full enough to fill volumes.

At length, Leia looked directly into his eyes and Luke could see the tension between them beginning to dissolve. 

“People can die of accidents, Luke. They die from stupid mistakes every day.” In her voice there was still anger, but there was concern too. “You didn't survive all that you've been through this far,” her eyes glanced fleetingly to the scars on his face and to his false hand, “to die here because you didn't take a few common-sense precautions.”

Now was the time to talk, and Luke was surprised to find himself apologizing. “I'm sorry, Leia.” He was even more surprised to realize he actually meant it. 

She wouldn't acknowledge the apology, not yet. Her anger was something that had to process. Instead she hoisted him on her back and carried him up the path. “Leia, you don't need to...”

“We're not far. I only brought The Creoleon, but it'll be of some help.”

“Han's not with you?” He was surprised, the thought of Leia traveling without Han hadn't even crossed his mind. 

“No.” Leia said flatly.

 _Why?_ Luke thought. But he knew better than to ask her, especially now.

 

The two were roughly the same height, but Luke was more muscular and had a denser bone structure than his sister. They made for an awkwardly lumbering figure making it's way up the path, but Leia didn't seem to be struggling under his weight, so Luke suppressed his pride as she plodded her ascent. 

“Did you even find it?” Leia questioned.

“Find what?”

“Oh, I don't know! What ever it was that you were looking for in this slimehole...”

Leia took a particularly jarring misstep from which she quickly recovered, but it caused Luke's injured leg to glance against a rock, sending a sharp shooting pain up his leg. Luke suppressed a howl.

Fear was receding now that Leia was here; and he was beginning to become more acutely aware of other things. Like pain, and a frustration that gnawed rather than bit.

He sighed, and a mite of the old petulance returned to his voice as he muttered dejectedly, “No.”

 

Outside the cavern entrance, Luke saw the a small, long insect-like ship alongside his own X-Wing.

Despite being a one-person ship The Creoleon boasted an impressive array of resource features, one of which was a fully equipped triage kit and mini-medical droid. Leia opened the wings of the ship and set her brother down on a makeshift cot, instructing the medical droid to care for him and see to his wounds.

From the X-Wing, R2-D2 emitted a series of concerned beeps. “It's alright R2, thanks.” 

“The bone is set, but the wound is infected.” The medical droid's voice was low and gravely, it deposited a pill-shaped object into Leia's hand with instructions: “Place the apparatus into the wound bed, it will sanitize the area and provide a bio-mesh for accelerated healing. You will also need a systemic anti-infective, which I do not carry in my inventory.”

“That seems like a pretty severe oversight on the part of your commissioner.” Leia said.

“I have identified 4 local species of fauna that may be helpful.” The droid projected a series of pictures highlighting the names and identifying characteristics of four different plants: A succulent conifer, tall with slender limbs. A low-lying shrub with feathery leaves and a bell-shaped fruit. A prickly moss with spore pods that appeared to flicker like a whisp of flame. And a delicate looking grey-green grass with lace-like leaves. This last one probably grew only in the valleys, Leia thought, she could hardly imagine something that delicate-looking surviving here. The high altitudes seemed more hospitable to the more hardy species. 

“Luke, are you going to be OK if I leave you alone?”

She half expected him to roll his eyes, instead he looked toward the medi-droid. “I'm still in pain.” 

The droid slapped an anesthetic to the wounded area, eliciting a surprised yelp, followed by a satisfied sigh. 

“I should be fine.”


	4. By Any Other Name

The only forms of life Leia had noticed on the planet so far had been the slime and spores growing in the caves. The surface world seemed comprised of rock, and air, and not much else. She surveyed the area surrounding them: it looked...austere, and sterile. Any soil or moisture must have been swept away by the seasonal windstorms, not even a scrap of moss in the cracks or crevices between rocks remained.

Leia looked up at Luke's X-Wing, eyeing R2 and the empty cockpit. She could use the craft to make a survey run, but then R2 beeped inquisitively and another idea came to her mind.

“R2. If I can get you to the summit, can you use your lifeforms sensors find those herbs for me?” 

The droid squeaked affirmatively and enthusiastically, and Leia smiled. 

A short hike later the droid and the human were overlooking an impressive mountainous terrain from it's highest vantage point. The horizon was dominated on one side by a glacial sea, which framed the setting of the planet's sun, while on the opposite side a full moon peeked up and was slowly hoisted above a treeless plain. And in between, at the base of the mountains, there was what appeared to be a series of mountain coves filled with water vapor. 

The two degrees of light, sun and moon, illuminated set the entire landscape in hues of gold and silver. It was breathtaking sight, even the droid gave impressed cooing noise at the spectacle of it, and for a moment they both watched in silent appreciation.

Leia was the first to recover at noticing the scarcity of vegetation. 

“Well there's a lot to look at, and not much to find. Right, R2?”

R2 emitted a string of beeps and began operating one of his sensor arms. After a few seconds waiting, he gave another exited squeal.

“What? Really! Where?”

The astromech bobbled between his two primary lower extremities, making it look like he was marching in place. 

Leia looked down to the rock and noticed for the first time that it was perforated with tiny holes. She knelt to examine them closer and saw...

 _Leaves?_

It was tiny, delicate blades of gray-toned grass, the same color as the rock, peaking up from below it's surface. And they were honeycombed with the same lace-like formation she'd seen on the medical-droid's hologram! 

Excited, Leia took a deep breath and she removed collecting utensils from her pouch and used them to pull a single stubborn stalk from the ground, complete with root system. Then another, and another, and another...this last one boasted a small round, white flower attached at the top. From it, she was surprised to find a familiar scent greeted her...

 _Starflower?_

She examined the specimen closely and inhaled the scent again. It was delicious, sweet, and fresh. And a caused a flood of memories to wash over her: playing on the grass of the palace when she was small, a picnic with her mother and father, and flowers that bloomed in starlight...

She held on to the memories and let them linger in her heart, and for the first time since she'd stood on the Death Star and watched the destruction of everything she'd ever loved, they didn't curdle inside her when she did so.

 

The plant though...It wasn't a starflower...

Starflowers petals were blue, not white. And they were pointed, not rounded. Their leaves weren't gray, they weren't riddled with holes, and their roots didn't dig into rock...

But that smell! And the rising moon to the blossoming flower, it marked them as a species akin to one another.

Now she looked around her, and saw the world with fresh eyes. The rocks that had made the landscape seem sterile and uninviting, now exhibited strength. The clear sky above made her feel free. And the air, now perfumed by the blooming of moonflowers, made everything smell like...

 

Back at the ships, Leia and R2 gave several large bunches of moonflower to the medical droid, who thanked them and set about preparing an extract. Leia wanted to show Luke the flowers, but she wasn't sure he would appreciate them in his present condition. Or at all...of course, they wouldn't mean the same thing to him as they did to her. 

Luke looked rather worse for the wear, and Leia put the flowers out of her mind for the time being.

“We found the medicine. You're gonna be alright, Luke.” She reassured him.

His response was sluggish and perhaps he was a bit disoriented because he kept repeating the same thing over and over again, but Leia couldn't quite make out what it was.

She looked up to the medical droid, “Are you sure he's going to be OK?” 

“The infection has taken hold faster than anticipated, but the tonic we have created is strong.” It said, as it inserted it via hypodermic injection. “Anticipate arrest of the infectious process within one solar cycle, but his body will have to clear out neutralized toxins, which will take longer. He will need to rest for the duration of the cleansing period.”

“I understand.” Leia nodded. 

Leia and R2 took turns standing guard that night, more to watch over Luke than to protect from outside threats. She lay under the sky, and watched the world turn, and in wonder now at how every component of this place seemed comfortable, familiar, and safe. 

_Except for the moons,_ She thought to herself, as she watched another one appear over the horizon and follow it's sister's accent in the night sky. _This world has two, Alderaan didn't even have one._

At the coldest part of the night, the medical droid drifted close to her to offered to check her temperature. 

“No I'm fine, thank you. I used to camp in a climate much colder than this.”

“If you are sure...” The droid bobbed, respectfully receding.

“I do have a question.”

“Yes?”

“What is the name of this planet?”

“According to the ships navigation archives, this planet's designation number is-” 

“No, I mean what do the people who live here call it. You know the plant species here, you must know the planet's given name.”

“Researching...” The droid paused for a moment in contemplation, and then said,

“It is not a part of my base programming, but it appears the inhabitants refer to the planet as “Bayith”. But that is hardly considered a proper name, due to it's use as a general linguistic term in various related languages. It simply means 'Home'”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am aware that in some sources Alderaan did actually have a moon. I'm basing this depiction off of "A New Hope" Junior novelization by Larry Weinburg. 
> 
> The summit scene with Leia and R2 was inspired by this painting: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b9/Caspar_David_Friedrich_-_Wanderer_above_the_sea_of_fog.jpg


	5. A Helping Hand

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> .

Luke woke to white sunlight pouring into his eyes. He grimaced and turned away at the pain of it, causing him to fall off his makeshift cot and hit the hard stone ground.

“Luke! You're awake!” It took him a moment to register his sister's excited voice as she rushed toward him. 

“Leia? What happened?” Luke said, trying to rise.

His mind was in a fog, he couldn't remember much from the night before, and he couldn't explain why his whole body felt like it'd been beaten with a stun rod. The world spun around him and his knees began to buckle.

“Easy...” Leia wrapped her arms around him, easing him back to the ground beside his cot. Luke only had the strength to sit upright, and that with Leia partially supporting his back. “Your liver is working overtime right now,” She brushed his hair away from his face and smiled affectionately, “You're a mess.” 

“What's that smell?” Luke rubbed his eyes, caught scent of something charred, and looked around.

“I just made breakfast!” Leia smiled with what Luke thought was uncharacteristic glee. 

Luke saw a thermal oven emiting waves of heat. Thin strips of meat and some obviously pre-packaged green leaves were roasting on a makeshift spit above it.

He looked from the food, to Leia, and back to the food as if trying to reconcile two incompatible images. But before he got the chance to wonder aloud, Leia was bringing him a skewer of charred meat and wilted leaves. 

“You should eat. It will help you heal faster.” She offered.

Luke took a bite, it tasted...fine. It wasn't until his stomach started growling that he realized how hungry he was and devoured the meal quickly. 

“How long has it been?” He asked with a mouth half full of food, attempting to recall his last clear memory before waking up, “Since...since you found me in the cavern?”

“It's not even been a full solar rotation yet.”

Luke breathed a sigh of relief, “Then I still have time. Leia there's a storm coming, a big one. We'll need to be off the mountain, preferably off the planet, in two days. But first I need to find something.” 

“What you came here for?” Leia poised herself on her knees, with the palm of one hand planted on the ground as if ready to spring into action.

“Yes, it's a holocron.” 

“OK...” Leia said encouragingly. 

“I've been tracking them...” Luke explained, “I went to the Emperor's Palace on Coruscant, where the old Jedi Training Temple used to be. By almost all accounts, The Emperor had the ones in the archive library destroyed, but the library itself still exists.”

“YOU WENT TO THE IMPERIAL PALACE?” Leia asked, incredulous. 

“The front door.” Look said sarcastically. “Apparently the imperial family still lives there and they didn't want an 'assassin' poking around their property.”

Leia looked like she was about to laugh with surprise, but a sullen look from Luke made her more circumspect. 

“You know, you're lucky they didn't try to kill you.”

“No. It's all very law-and-order on Coruscant . Nothing shady or underhanded there. They're so...civil.” He muttered the last sentence under his breath, clear disdain oozed from every word. 

“Welcome to the wars of peace.” Leia wrapped an arm around his shoulder and squeezed. “The Empire is no longer officially recognized, even in it's former capital. But the _people_...they're still there, and we can't deal with each other the same way we did before. I'm actually glad to hear they understand that.” 

Luke shifted uncomfortably against her. “But I did find something,” he said, changing the direction of the conversation, “At the Intelligence Bureau. A librarian named Jocasta Nu escaped the Empire's siege on the temple and it seems that she took several holocrons and data cores with her.” 

“What happened to her?”

“I don't know.” Luke admitted. Darth Vader hunted her down, but apparently the trail went dead. She was never found. But I do know is that she deposited her intel in several safe-holds throughout the galaxy. And one of them is right below us.”

“Wait, if you could track a holocron here, what would have stopped The Empire from taking it from here long ago?”

“I don't know! They were able to track her here, but by the time they did she was long gone and the data was nowhere to be found.”

Leia considered for a moment. “How do you know it's still here?” 

“I don't know for certain, but I believe it's likely. All the sources I've studied point to here and...I found evidence of a security system.”

“Is that what broke your leg?”

“No, what broke my leg was stupidity. That, and bad luck.”

Leia thought for a moment, “Luke, this information...it's very important to you?”

“Of course! Leia, I know what being a Jedi means to me but I don't know what it _means_ to be a Jedi. I want to restore the Jedi Order, and to do that I need to know more about how they operated as an organization.” 

“Ok.” Leia nodded with conviction. “If it's here, I'll find it for you.”

 

Luke eyed her skeptically. It occurred to him that she'd been behaving very strangely this morning. She was always motivated, but today her exuberance was almost overbearing. She was no longer angry at him for embarking on this quest without leaving notice. She'd never shown any particular interest in Jedi affairs before and...

 

“Where is Han?” Luke asked.

“Han?” Leia blinked. 

“Your husband.”

Leia's face fell, just for a fraction of a second. “He...he left me our second day out. We'd just settled in to this nice little cottage and...then he said he had to leave. That it was important; a matter of life and death...for a friend.”

“And he didn't want to take you with him?” Luke said, and he couldn't keep a note of dejection from creeping into his voice. 

Leia blinked at him, and for a moment Luke thought she might be insulted, then her eyes widened.

“No, Luke you can't think that...that I'm only here because of Han. I'm not. I'm here for you, because you need me. You can't go back into the caves in your condition and I'm better equipped than you. I can help. I want to help, please!” 

Luke cursed himself inwardly. Leia knew just what to say. She always knew just what to say to make him... _melt_. Of course, he knew it was just was one of the the things she did to get what she wanted. But how could he refuse? What she was begging for was something he already wanted from her.

“OK.” He said, accepting the idea. 

In the silence that followed, Luke realized that something was wrong within him...something missing. He explored himself and recognized it: resentment. He was still carrying it and it was directed towards his sister, although he couldn't quite understand why. He brushed these feelings aside and a rush of appreciation flowed as he realized the sacrifices that she was willing to make for him.

“Thank you, Leia.” The response was heartfelt this time, “Thank you very much.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Luke and Leia's dynamic here was really fun to write. In the films we always see Leia as the angry and resentful one, mostly as a response to a lot of the losses she's had in her life. Now she's just embarking on a path to emotional healing and Luke's the one who has to deal with an abandonment of sorts.


	6. Wish You Were Here

-Luke-

“Have you ever gone cavern-crawling before?”

“Do asteroids count?” Leia quipped back as she packed her equipment and reconfigured her sack into a backpack. 

Although Luke assured her air was clean and plentiful for the first leg of the journey, she dressed in a flexible full body suit and full face mask with air tank to protect from the fungal spores. A light source was clipped at her temple and fingertips, climbing and levitation gear was in her sack along with a spare lamp, a canteen, and nutrition bar.

“How do I look?” She said, standing at the ready.

The truth was, she looked a bit like a bug, but Luke didn't want to tell her so. “You look...prepared.” He smiled. “Leia there's one more thing I wanted to mention: When I when I was on my way back up, I grabbed something that felt like mechanical debris.”

“What did it look like?” 

“It was ...friable.” He said, trying to remember. “And thin. Like a sheet of metal, but it broke apart in my hand. If there was...or is...a manufacturing presence in the caverns, we need to be extra careful.”

Leia frowned, “The natives are supposedly primitive farmers, and there isn't any record of off-world industrial interest.”

“Yes, but I'm not referring to activities within the legal spectrum.”

“Oh.” She said, nodded in understanding. “I'll keep that in mind.”

“Are you sure you're alright with this?” 

“Of course!” She said, beaming excitedly and patting him assuredly on the shoulder. 

Something is definitely...different with Leia, Luke thought. He still couldn't understand why she was so excited about this venture, was it really just to help him? 

“You'll keep a com open!” He shouted as she walked away, “Of course!” She yelled back. 

 

-Leia-

Leia turned on her com and head lamp right before she went into the cave. 

There was silence over the line, and the only noise in the cave was the sound of her own breathing.

“Does my breathing bother you?” She asked after a while.

“No, it tells me you're OK.” She heard the concern, and perhaps a bit of frustration, in his voice.

Leia chuckled. 

“What do you see?” He asked.

Leia looked around. “Well, the ground below is soft, I think it's padded with soil.” _There was so little soil on the surface it seems strange that..._ “And the walls are just hard rock and there's this...gross fungus is everywhere.” _Probably harboring whatever almost killed Luke._

Leia was wary of it, but curious too. Her visor showed that they gave off thermal energy, she tested the light and found, interestingly that the organisms also emitted a faint green glow in the dark.

There was no proper map, but she navigated with a compass directory that allowed her to gauge the direction the core of the mountain was supposed to be. Whenever there was a bifurcation in the passageway, she would test one to see if it's course went true. Oftentimes she had to retreat and try another. 

 

Further on, she was climbing more than walking. On one particularly vertical shaft, her light source caught something glinting along the passage wall. “I see something.” She called out to Luke over the com, “I'm going to take a closer look.” She clambered closer to it and found what looked like an ore vein, following the shaft down almost straight down. 

“It looks like it's just a mineral deposit.” She reached out and dusted it with her fingers revealing an unnaturally metallic sheen, “If ore refined itself while it was still in the vein...” She corrected.

She heard a sharp intake of breath on the other side of the com. 

“Did you feel that?” Luke asked.

“Feel what?” 

“I think it was an earthquake.”

“No.”

“Leia you should come back up.” 

“What!? No, I'm almost there!”

“This is serious, Leia. You could get trapped down there!”

“I bet it was the vein, I touched it just before. I just won't touch it again and it'll be fine.”

“Leia...” 

She heard him draw out the last syllable of her name in warning, the way she often found herself doing with Han.

Leia considered turning off the com but remembered her promise. “Luke listen to me.” She said adopting her most calm, assuring, but authoritative voice, “There's nothing wrong down here. I'm safe.”

As if in demonstration of complete trust in the truth of that statement, she turned off her light source. As she expected, she was not enveloped in black but instead the (quite possibly poisonous) fungi lit up around her and the cavern walls were illuminated even more brightly than before in hues of green and blue. 

The sight was an absolute delight for Leia, she felt the warmth and protection of the mountain around her and she wasn't afraid. Not of rock slides, or earthquakes, or darkness, or the unknown. In the place of fear, instead, was a pleasant anticipation of one who is coming home after a long journey. 

The irony of it struck her, but it was more a delight than a dissuasion: there was a novelty to coming home to a place you'd never been before.

She dangled in the chasm appreciatively and then slowly, methodically continued her decent. 

Gradually she noticed the light from the walls start do dim as vegetation grew scarce. But it wasn't until she had reached the base of the shaft (Standing on soft earth once again), that she turned her light source back on. 

“Oh, Luke I wish you were here to see this!”


	7. Lonely Together

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> ...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I tried making this one as short as I can; it's still a bit on the descriptive side (Also Luke doesn't show up until the very end). It's a setting I've been looking forward to, and it introduces a little mystery I'm looking forward to exploring in future chapters. :)

Leia turned up her visor light greater visibility, and even then it only illuminated a small part of the gigantic cavern before her. It the cavern did not appear to be empty, and she was drawn into it by the interplay of illuminated objects and the shadows they cast. 

In the center of the cavern was what appeared to be a very large tree, with its branches reaching outward and upward; spanning from the walls on each side of the cavern to the towering ceiling above. It was so lifelike in form that Leia was surprised to find, as she walked closer, that there were no leaves were growing on it. 

_Of course there aren't leaves,_ Leia thought to herself, _it's not a real tree..._

She tried to describe what she was seeing, for Luke's benefit as well as her own bubbling wonder at this wondrous find, but words failed her and Luke's only response was a short acknowledgement.

_Is he angry?_ She thought briefly, but soon she was thoroughly absorbed in exploring the cathedral-like mountain core. 

Of course, as she thought about it, it all made sense: the soft earth above and the remnants of machinery Luke had found: this had to have been some kind of old mining operation, either forgotten from eons of unuse or illegally built, un-registered, and abandoned long ago. 

It still seemed to be in impeccable shape, though: There were no cracks or chips in the “tree” at all. And the walls of the cavern themselves, with the “ore-veins” that surely weren't mere ore-veins...were polished to a sheen. None of the fungi grew here either...

At the thought of that, Leia grew suspicious and lowered her light. This place could have been long abandoned, but if that were so how could it remain so pristine? 

A little more cautiously now, she walked around the cavern mindful of every noise she made and how the sound carried throughout the chamber, she lowered her com with a whisper of explanation to Luke and didn't wait for a reply.

She wasn't like Luke, who seemed to have this uncanny awareness about him. He would know if he was being watched, Leia had no idea, and that made her even more wary.

Slowly, she made her way around the cathedral-like chamber, which was vaguely circular in it's orientation, and noticed that there seemed to be smaller openings on every side. 

On the far side of the Tree, Leia noticed a stone signpost with engraved inscriptions on it. They seemed to be written in glyphic text. The characters were vaguely familiar to her, as if she'd seen samples of the language before, but the translation or even the particular language they belonged to, was not forthcoming in her mind.

Carefully she walked to each opening around the tree and peered inside: several of them were self-enclosed, roomlike and empty (which, she was surprised to find, was both a relief and a disappointment). Built to the dimensions of someone slightly larger than the average human being.

A few of them were large corridor-like passageways which she couldn't see the far side of. She considered following one, but ultimately decided to finish her tour of “the cathedral” first.

Her heart jumped and the shadows in the next room: She focused her light and saw a series of large mechanical constructs; machinery she could only imagine were mining supplies, arranged in rows on either side of the wall. Some of them were simple, no more than oversize buckets or bores, others appeared almost droid-like. One particularly caught her eye was brassy-gold in color, with lanky arms and short legs. She started again at the reflective yellow/gold eyes that seemed to stare back at her. But nothing moved: these machines were either de-activated or de-comissioned long ago, and so she passed on.

What she didn't notice, however, how the light from the hulking droid-like apparatus was not entirely reflective, and that the two orbs of yellow-golden continued to emit a dim glow even after her visor-light had ceased to shine on them.

In another chamber she noticed a sort of railing on the either side of the walls and floor, as if to guide gigantic carts down the passageway. Leia hesitated, tempted to follow this one on the inkling that it would probably lead to the outside of the mountain. But a though of the holos, a disappointed Luke, and her own reluctance to leave a place that held such wonder for her kept her from leaving just yet.

There were fourteen doorways in total: The four large corridors arranged cardinally, and the smaller rooms in between. 

Leia began to relax. There was no danger in this place, she was sure of it now. This place was in good condition because it was well constructed and protected from outside elements. There was obviously less moisture and organic material here, so it was not a hospitable place for the planet's flora to grow. 

She knew what she had to look for: it was a library, and this place was so clean and organized it wouldn't have been hard to find, except for the fact that it was so much larger than she'd thought it would be. If this was a mining establishment it seemed reasonable their might be a directory somewhere. She thought back to the glypic signpost near The Tree and went to examine it closer, but no new insight or understanding revealed itself. So, she created a diagram outlining the main compartments adjoining the large central cathedral in the hopes that it would help her avoid getting lost.

She considered taking one of the cardinal corridors that lead to each side of the mountain, but then she thought back to the huge droid-like being she'd seen: possibly the last remnant of this huge machine, or mining camp, or whatever it had been. It had seemed to be in good repair: if she could only figure out how to activate it's data-core then all her problems might be solved.

She was just about decided upon this attempt when she turned and saw the giant lurking figure, perched in a squat, silently staring down at her.

Leia was so startled she fell over on her back. Torn between the urge to run away and an instinctual need to keep the threatening figure within her sight, she crawling slowly backwards, watching for any threatening gesture. The hulking creature remained motionless.

She continued to crawl backward, putting as much distance as she could between it and herself, and it wasn't until she had crawled over a body-length away that it's head tilted slightly, following her movement.

Then Leia realized it wasn't poised to _attack_ , it was poised to _inspect_. Inside, her panic was beginning to wain. She consciously took a few breaths, considering. It wasn't threatening, it was curious. It was waiting for her to make the first move...

Slowly, never removing her eyes from the being, she stood up. It stood up too; on it's stubby legs it still towered over her, looking down almost expectantly. 

“Hello” She offered.

But the being made no response and Leia knew any chance it could understand any language familiar to her was minimal.

_If only I had 3PO with me..._ She thought for what must have been the first time.

Then it occurred to her that what, while the being might not understand her words, it most definitely could understand her actions. Many gestures among the humanoid races of the galaxy were held in common, reciprocal even. And she she decided to take a chance:

Careful to not make to make any concealing motions, or threatening gestures, she removed her mask and placed it on the ground. Followed by her backpack, taking out every object inside it, she removed her heavy oversuit and even her shoes until she was left with nothing left other than a light underclothes. She arraigned them all in rows, from large to small, and stood up. 

"I'm unarmed." She said, not that the words themselves would make a difference. 

Curiously, now that she was more scantily clad, she notice a draft of air coming from one of the corridor passageways. 

The only lights were coming from her visor, which was on the ground, and the eyes and the reflective surfaces of the gigantic being before her. It bent down to examine, not her at first, but her belongings. It picked up each one and held them closely to it's eyes, then set them back down exactly as Leia had placed them. It stood still, as if analyzing her a moment and then made a vocalization that sounded like the grinding gears and rubbing of metal. It was so loud that and Leia instinctively covered her ears, but the sound still seemed to seep into her bones grind at her insides. 

Even after the noise had stopped, Leia noticed her body was trembling, and she felt like her insides had been shaken up a bit, and re-arranged. 

When it was over, Leia tentatively uncovered her ears, which still rang, and spoke in softly in every language she knew: “I'm sorry, I don't understand you.” as politely as she could. She wondered if the being could even hear her the wavelength of her vocalizations. 

The being turned away from her and walked toward the signpost/directory near The Tree. Leia followed behind, it stood in front of the directory as if giving the signpost it's full and complete attention. Leia looked at the sign again, but it made no more sense to her then it had before. She looked from the lurking being, standing at full attention, to the directory several times. Eventually the being even gestured crudely to it, as if asking her to take a closer look. 

She stepped forward and touched the sign. It, like everything else in this cavern, was immaculately polished. No insight occurred to her about the sign, but something else became suddenly apparent.

“Are you the caretaker of this place?” She asked. “What happened here?!” 

The being didn't nod or appear to acknowledge her words in any way, but continued to stare at the signpost as if it were the most important thing in the whole room. 

She slowly walked towards the huge droid-like being and examined it more closely, she saw the delicate cogs and wheels that made up it's interior. She noticed that it had several different appendages attached along it's back and sides, even a pair of longer legs. It struck her at once how pristine and perfect everything looked, and for some reason it made her sad. 

Sad that she couldn't understand what was so important about the sign. Sad that she couldn't speak to a being who was so obviously desperate to communicate with her...possibly the only other cognizant being it had had contact with for a very, very long time. 

The two looked at each other and shared a moment of _...was it loneliness?_ Leia had no conception of how long they stood there together for, But she wasn't anxious to put the moment behind her. The thought occurred to her that this being had probably stood as a lone sentinel for more years than she could count, so she could spare a few minutes, or hours...as the case may be. She stood there for a long time and the silence told her things her ears would never understand.

Eventually she reached out and touched it, in what she hoped would be recognized as a sympathetic gesture, and spoke again, “I'm sorry.” 

Even though she wasn't sure _what_ she was sorry about, the feeling was still there. And she knew, somehow, that they shared it.

The Keeper stood up to it's full height again and moved, more quickly than she would have thought possible, to where her belongings sat on the floor and returned them to her. She dressed, but kept her mask and visor strapped below her neck. 

“I'm looking for something.” she said, still unsure the being could understand her. It just looked back at her expectantly. She sighed. It was a good thing, though, that it didn't seem to find her voice as painful as she found the noise it made. “I need to find a library, or data cache...Everything is so organized here, it can't imagine it would be hard to find it, if I only knew the way.”

But she didn't know the way, and no matter how hard she tried the lurking keeper couldn't seem to understand a word she said.

So Leia lead, and The Keeper followed. With The Keeper's help, she soon found that The Tree had corresponding root system that reached unknown depths below it. And much of it, like the cathedral-like chamber above, was hallowed out. In fact, she began to think of it less as a mining colony and more of an entire underground city. 

She explored only the first two levels (ate through her nutrition bar and drank through most of her canteen while she was at it) before she found it. The room was more like a museum than a library: full of strange artifacts from all over the galaxy. They were labeled, but in the same glypic language that she couldn't recognize.

On a case in the back, below a gigantic skull, she saw to holo devices: one blue and one red. She wanted to grab them, but somehow it felt strangely like stealing with the keeper standing beside her. 

She looked back towards The Keeper, “I know you probably can't understand a word I'm saying. But this,” She indicated the holos “is what I've been looking for. I need to take them.” The being didn't respond, but it also didn't resist when she picked up the two objects and made for the entryway.

The being followed her, almost obediently, as she made her way back to the cathedral. 

She was tempted to take the holos out and examine them more closely. _That's probably a job better for Luke..._

_**LUKE!** _

How could she have forgotten! Her com had been out all of this time! She turned it back up spoke quickly, her voice nearing a panic, almost yelled into it. “Luke? Luke! Are you still there?! I've found them. Luke, I have them. I'm on my way back...”

There was no answer.

She felt the urgency of her task now, as she hadn't before. She'd left Luke in a vulnerable position; in terms of his physical ability and his location at the top of a mountain that was expecting a windstorm very soon...

“I need to get back to the entry near the summit!” She spoke aloud, and walked toward the shaft from where she had entered The Cathedral, but the lurking Keeper stood in her way. 

“No, I have to go. I have someone who needs me...I came in this way...”

But The Keeper/Caretaker wouldn't budge. For a moment, Leia considered the possibility of what she would do if the being would try to hold her against her will, but then it made the smallest of vocalizations, which still made her ears rumble, and lead her to the room it had originally come from. It took out what looked like a gigantic bucket, _An ore-cart_ she realized, and placed it on the rails in the adjoining corridor. 

The draft from this corridor was more like a breeze now, and she understood. She climbed in to the bucket and The Keeper pushed. 

Leia was in awe of how fast this being could move when it wanted to, and it wasn't long before there was natural light coming from above. She looked up, surprised when she couldn't see the sky anymore, but of course she was at the base of the mountain now: under a thick layer of cloud.

Once the ore-cart stopped. She peeked up above the brim and saw that the valleys of Bayith, compared to the mountaintops, were very green and fertile. Turf was on the ground and the succulent-trees, she recognized them from the med-droid's description although she couldn't quite remember what they were called, towered above.

She climbed out of the ore-cart, her eyes followed the ore-cart tracks: some of them lead further up the mountain, towards the summit, another way lead further in to the valley, but apparently this was as far as the Mountain Keeper was willing to go. It stood like a sentinel where rock ended and soft earth began.

“Thank you” she said, facing it and bowing respectfully, and to her surprise a moment later it returned the gesture. 

Leia was about to start her ascent, following the ore-cart tracks up to the summit enterance, then she heard a familiar voice yell her name from behind her. It was Luke, she yelled enthusiastically back at him. He was walking with a limp from the wooded valley. And from the expression on his face, he was not appropriately thrilled to see her.


	8. Almost Mistakes

Luke liked to see himself as a fairly even tempered person, but he had his moments and this was one of them. He was angry at Leia for not making contact, and then she had the audacity to stand there, uninjured, after all the effort and grief she'd put him through...

He saw the expression on her face change from elation to caution as he approached, and for some reason he found it oddly gratifying. 

“I told you I was fine!” She said aloud, once he'd gotten within speaking range.

“Yesterday!” He bellowed back. “Leia, you told me you were fine YESTERDAY...Then I heard nothing...What was I supposed to think?”

Leia winced. “I...I didn't know it had been that long...I lost track of time...I brought the holos!” She offered her pack, a bit more bulky than it had been when she'd left.

Luke grabbed the bag and threw it on the ground. Then he wagged an index finger in her face, “Don't every do that again.”

“Luke, you don't understand,” She reasoned, “At first I couldn't..and then...I forgot. But look I'm fine!” She insisted. 

“Leia, after you turned off your com there was another earthquake.” Luke said, adopting a lower tone.

“What?” Leia said, her mouth agape. “I never felt an earthquake!”

“It caused an avalanche and destroyed two homes.” He indicated the people standing behind him, one of whom boasted a splint to one of it's upper extremities, “And if they weren't out gathering harvest before the wind storm that's coming _tonight_ someone would have died.”

He didn't outright say it, but the insinuation was still there: This was all Leia's fault. And he could tell she believed it, too. He saw the struggle between pride and embarrassment play out on her face: a reluctance to admit any wrongdoing on her part. Luke supposed it was part of some sort of leadership-instinct to maintain the trust of her followers. Luke knew she wouldn't abandon that mindset even if there was no one to lead, she just didn't know any other way.

After some moments of searching, the expected response came. An excuse, rather than an apology:

“It was an accident.” 

“People can die from accidents, Leia. They die from mistakes every day...” Oh, it felt _good_ to rebuke her with her own words! 

He watched her eyes widen a fraction and her mouth opened as if she was about to respond. But she closed it again. She wouldn't apologize, of course she wouldn't...Not when her pride was wounded. 

Luke hardly had time to revel in reactive self-righteousness, almost from the instant the words had left his lips he knew he was wrong...and right...

Perhaps it was the feeling of satisfaction that it had given him but he knew that even though the words were true, the anger that they had come from was not entirely justified. 

Leia picked up the discarded pack containing the holos and clutched them close to her as she walked past. She went without looking him in the eye, and holding herself a little less loftily than she was normally accustomed. 

They walked back to the village, passing the two buildings that had been damaged in what was, truthfully, more of a rock slide than an avalanche. One of the buildings was actually a village shrine, Luke hadn't mentioned that, and he saw Leia's eyes follow a toppled statue as she walked past the site. 

The Village Priest _Or Priestess? It's always difficult to determine gender on an Aves when they don't have feathers..._ beckoned Leia to it's side and spoke to her softly. It was a kind gesture, even though Luke knew hardly any of the villagers were conversational in Galactic Common. The Priest was one who's home had been destroyed, apparently the Aves were not ones for hard feelings. 

Now that Luke got a better look at the damage, it wasn't so bad really: Two damaged buildings and one person with a minor injury. It had been much more dramatic up on the mountain, when the cave had collapsed and the trail seemed to fall out from under him. He'd flown down to the village with Leia's craft on autopilot, injured and though poor visibility, and he ended up landing on a livestock paddock. Scared a poor farmer out of his wits, of course he would never tell Leia about this if he could help it...

Luke was eager to leave the planet before the winds set in, but Leia didn't even seem to notice her ship as she followed the villagers into a sort of town square and joined an assembly line of villagers relaying dried fruitmeat to an underground shelter.

Many of the Aves' species had wings, the variety on this planet did not...at least not any that were large enough or powerful enough to fly with, gravity was just too strong. However it seemed they had not yet completely adapted to ground life as they didn't have anything approximating a cart, or even a basket to carry goods or supplies in. Instead they passed each single piece of dried fruit by hand.

It looked tedious.

Luke was irritated. Leia was willing to win back her pride at the cost of inconveniencing him, and exhausting herself, to do a job no one needed her to do. He considered using The Force to move all the fruit over at once and have it be done with, but once again his rational judgment won out. He saw that that solution would merely be a short-term fix to a lingering problem: the disconnect between himself and Leia. 

He looked at her again...poor, sleep-deprived, beautiful Leia. 

She'd clearly been awake and active for more than an entire solar cycle and was beginning to show signs of fatigue, Leia dismissively waved away the suggestion that she rest and continued to work alongside villagers. So instead, Luke worked alongside her. Of course, it wasn't until after all the food was taken into the vault, the sun was down, and one moon was peaking over the horizon, that she was finally willing to admit she was tired.

Luke found her a soft stretch of turf to rest. Leia handed him the satchel containing the holos, closed her eyes and promptly fell asleep. 

The sound of her breathing, deep and regular, brought back every tender feeling he had for his sister. It would be another couple of minutes before she fell into deep sleep, and then she would start snoring. 

Luke sat beside her turned his attention toward the satchel. Pulling out one holocron, he was surprised to find that it emanated a red glow. Jedi holos were designed to be opened using The Force, so he tried, but no amount of Force manipulation he tried seemed to be the key to unlocking this particular one. Confused, he put I away and pulled out the second: this one was blue and automatically he sensed the correct Force signature and opened it. 

It floated before him and information crashed into his mind like a wave. He hadn't been expecting this, but the sensation was not overwhelming, and it didn't seem to do any harm, so he continued to explore. Eventually the waves of intel became less and less intense until they became a steady pool with only occasional rippling and e saw the history of the Jedi Order from the perspective of some of it's greatest masters. The evolution of the Jedi from simple monks to warriors was chronicled, the rise and fall of the first Sith Empire _there was more than one?_ , and hundreds of other facts that his mind had difficulty processing all at once...

Luke wasn't sure how long he'd sat there exploring the holo when he saw Leia bolt upright from the corner of his eye. Moonlight reflected in her pale skin, she breathed heavily several times and then relaxed and lay back down. She couldn't have slept very long because he hadn't even got to hear her snore this time. 

“We still have a couple of hours before the winds set in, you can sleep if you'd like.” He said, still delving into the history of the Jedi Council during the early days of the Old Republic.

She watched him quietly for a few moments, then asked “Was the avalanche really that bad?”

Luke shrugged “You saw most of it.”

“I was worried about you.” She said, “About your leg. I was going to climb back up.”

“No. It's good you didn't. The summit cavern caved in. My wound started opening up again when I started walking, but I once I got to the village the healer treated me and the bleeding stopped. It hasn't started again and the biomesh seems to be holding well, I'll be alright.”

“Why didn't you come down here to start with, instead landing on the mountain?”

A flash of irritation returned to Luke, didn't she realize how treacherous a blind landing was? No, she didn't because she'd probably never done one before!

He took a deep breath before responding, “The skies are clear now; there's good visibility, it wasn't like that when I first arrived. I assume that has something to do with the approaching winds. Also, I didn't want to cause any disruption for the natives.”

“Yeah, look at how well that turned out.” Leia said ruefully. 

Then she did something Luke was not expecting: she bent her head slightly and said, “I'm sorry...” 

Luke closed the holo, and gave Leia his full attention. Luke might have expected to feel a measure of satisfaction at a humbled apology from her, but he didn't. “Leia, we don't know if it was you caused the earthquake. Just because you were underground at the time is no reason to assume...”

“But I think I did, Luke.” She interrupted, her voice almost quivering. “There was something at the base of the mountain. I think I caused it to make the mountain shake.” She explained about the guardian machine in the mountain.

Luke wasn't surprised. Aside what he'd found in the cavern, the natives were not nearly so primitive as he had been lead to believe. It seemed likely that they may have lived alongside a more industrially developed race at one time. 

“No one died though.” He added, after she'd finished. 

The response had it's intended effect, and Leia chuckled. 

“Anything interesting?” She asked, indicating the holos.

“I was able to open one of them.” He said, scratching his forehead, “It has a lot of data but I think it might be corrupted.”

“Is information missing?”

“No, it's very thorough. But it's riddled with inconsistencies. It contains intel from several different periods in the history of the Jedi. The closer I look the more I see it contradicting itself.”

“So, you think these machines can lie?” Leia asked. “You make it sound like it's alive.”

“It might be.” Luke admitted, laying down on the turf alongside her and looked up at the sky. “ It behaves more like a mind than a simple database, and it has a...a feeling.”

“Feeling?” Leia sounded amused. 

“A mind is perhaps the most complex sensory organ in any being. It feeds on sensation, if it doesn't have any to work with, it sometimes makes it up just so it can make sense of what it isn't feeling.” Luke shook his head, 'Several sources contributed to the creation of this holo. It's almost like...like they've spent several ages arguing, and still haven't come up with an agreement as to what actually happened.”

Leia was completely lost now, so Luke decided to use a more concrete example: 

“When I lost my hand on Cloud City I was in horrible pain, of course, but I could also feel my fingers move even though they weren't there, because the neural circuits controlling my hand are still up here.” Luke pointed to his temple, “And they don't know my hand is missing, so they invent sensation to convince themselves that the hand is still there.”

“You know, I think I prefer it when machines are just tools and don't think for themselves.”

Luke shrugged, “That's all a mind is anyway. A thinking tool. I'm glad this one is a little more sophisticated. If it were a regular data core it would take forever to go though. Then I'd have to get R2, and 3PO to translate...”

For some reason this turn of conversation seemed to make Leia more agitated. Luke was calm enough now, and in tune with The Force, to sense frustration radiating from her. 

“That makes sense, but...I don't know Luke, if my mind is just a tool than what am I? I think, I understand, I feel, I do. All of these things wouldn't be possible without my mind.” She was looking up at the sky now, and watching the second moon peek above the horizon.

Luke said nothing. He thought he understood his sister better than he had ever had before, but he didn't feel confident that he could make her understand herself. That was one of the reason's he'd not yet explicitly offered her training in the ways of the of the Jedi.

When they'd first met, he'd been positively enamored with her. Even later on, when she was obviously strategic: showering him with affection when she was upset with Han or when she needed someone to vent her emotions to, he still adored her. He was the one she would come to for comfort, and that had given him a sense of pride.

Once, on Hoth of all places, they'd nearly taken their affections too far. Luke turned her down, because it didn't feel right. His mind, his greatest tool, had known what his youthful hormones could not: Leia's heart was always after Han. Always...Luke Skywalker was just a welcome distraction. 

It saved him from doing something he'd have regretted for the rest of his life, and it freed him to love her in different ways. To embrace her whole being even, and especially, her flaws...the parts of her no lover would ever understand.

And even now the magnificent tool warned him that he was vulnerable. 

As they lay side by side looking up at the night sky, he couldn't keep himself from wondering what would happen if she straddled him right now. If she entwined her legs with his, pressing her body into him until he felt every curve and caressed his cheek with those pale delicate hands. If he felt the breath from her lips on his cheek, making the hairs on his neck stand up on end. If he heard his name come in a desperate, breathy whisper, if her lips crashed into his with unexpected ferocity, spreading, exploring....if her tongue brushed between his lips, pulsating with need and hinting at deeper, more illicit pleasures...would he be able to refuse her now?

Of course...she wouldn't. He knew that but still, it would not bode well for them to be alone together for any extended period of time. Conflict there was enviable.

No, everything would be back to normal once she got back to Han...

 

All of this flashed through his mind in a matter of moments before Leia interrupted, “Do you know, Luke? Do you know what you are without your mind?”

“Yes.” He said simply.

She looked at him with something like awe, and perhaps a bit of fear, but she didn't ask him to elaborate.

“I didn't mean to give you an existential crisis.” Luke laughed, shaking his head.

“No. Thank you, Luke. It helps me understand you more.”

“I didn't realize I was so difficult to understand.”

“Of course not if you live in your own...mind....”

She reached out and took it his hand. It was unexpected but Luke didn't pull away. They watched the second moon rise to join it's sister in the sky. They were both still very bright, but perhaps a little bit smaller than they had been before.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the crux of the conflict I see keeping Leia and Luke from really being brother and sister. A lot of people focus on the "incest" but that's only a part of it to me, and I think people kinda tend to overlook an interesting dynamic of the Original Trio because of it. Leia is excited by Han, but she's also drawn to Luke. At first, to us (the viewer), it seems like Luke is the more reliable one and probably that's why she's drawn to him. But over time Luke goes off to fight and then he goes off to get Jedi training: He's got his own life going on and Han is the one who ends up staying with her, against his own self interest. 
> 
> It's not my intent in this story to make Han Solo a scumbag. In fact I think he has a very good reason for why he would stand her up their honeymoon. What I want to bring out in this story is insecurity in Leia and how she deals with it, and the vulnerability in Luke and how he deals with it.
> 
> I want to ask what is it specifically that brings these two people together? Aside from simply being related, what makes them a family?


	9. The Red Holocron

_Leia unexpectedly found herself walking along a spacious hall in solitude. She admired a high arched ceiling and ornate decorations on the walls, but it wasn't until she got to the balcony overlooking the lake that she recognized where she was._

_On Alderaan, in the Royal Palace._

_Her old room, she was sure, was up high in the tower exactly as she'd left it. She knew that, if she continued to walk down the main corridor on her left, she would eventually reach her father's office on the mountainside. Mother's Throne Room was on the Lakeside. She very well could have been in court at this time of day...but Leia knew, somehow, that she wasn't. Her father wouldn't be in his office either. Leia couldn't understand how that knowledge come to her with such definitive certainty...and pain._

 _Tears begin to well up inside of her, and an intense longing and loneliness was threatening to emerge. As she struggled to contain them an empty, aching feeling began in the pit of her stomach and rose into her chest, finally settling heavily on her heart and beginning to choke it...No it wasn't choking, it was...feeding... off of it. She felt it becoming full and swollen with her life juices until her chest was an empty shell, a host to a the bloated parasite rattling against her rib cage._

_Then she heard it. From far down some distant corridor: the relentless cries of a lone infant, and her heart beat again. Instinctually she walked in the direction she thought the sound was coming from, and as she did so she heard the cries become louder and more frantic. She quickened her pace, looking in every room...They were all empty, but the sound continued to grow until the shrieks were nearly deafening._

_Panic gave way to despair. The swollen thing in her chest puffed itself up, as if a sudden surge of nutrient made it engorged. She felt it press against her windpipe. He final thoughts, as she sunk to the heavy stone floor, were that no one would never find the crying infant and no one would ever walk the halls of that beautiful palace ever again._

And then she woke up. 

Luke was sitting beside her, intently gazing into the blue holocron that levitated before him. Confusion gave way to relief, the choking feeling submerged itself back into the pit of her stomach, and she took a very deep breath.

“We still have a couple of hours before the winds set in, you can sleep if you'd like.”

Leia was surprised. She'd been afraid he was going to ask her to leave straight away, but of course, he didn't exactly have a home to got to. And had the holocrons now. That was what he really wanted, wasn't it?

“Was the avalanche really that bad?” She asked.

Luke shrugged “You saw most of it.” his focus was still on the holo.

“I was worried about you. About your leg. I was going to climb back up.” She said quickly.

“No. It's good you didn't.” Luke said flatly, “The summit cavern caved in. My wound started opening up again when I started walking,” Leia winced at this, “but I once I got to the village the healer treated me and the bleeding stopped. It hasn't started again and the biomesh seems to be holding well, I'll be alright.”

She would have to remember to thank the Healer later.

As Luke didn't seem distracted by conversation in the slightest, she continued to talk to him. Surprised to find how relaxing the simple act of talking to him was. 

 

Then, when he was done examining the holo, she confessed to him what she'd found in the mountain as well as her own role in awakening it. Luke didn't seem surprised in the slightest, he wasn't even blaming her now. 

“No one died though.”

She laughed, but it made the thing in the pit of her stomach began to throb unexpectedly, so she cut it off quickly and changed the subject to something Luke would find more interesting. 

As Luke explained his predicament with the holos (one was seemingly locked, the other contained contradictory information) Leia was struck by how differently Luke saw the galaxy from anyone else she'd ever known. From the day she'd first met him she'd felt more akin to him than anyone (aside from her own family, of course...the one's who'd raised her...). After the destruction of Alderaan she'd clung to him for that sense of belonging and familiarity, but now and again there were moments when she realized how _different_ he was, and how much of him she didn't understand. 

Once Luke was asleep, Leia reached for her satchel. The holos were still inside. She pulled out the blue one Luke had been examining, it wasn't even glowing anymore. _maybe it's sleeping too_ she thought.

The red one, though, still flickered red beneath her fingertips. Luke had said the holos had minds, this one looked like a heart. The light inside it pulsed: brightening and dimming to a slow, regular beat. It made it difficult to examine in the dark. She turned away from Luke, shielding him from it's light, and let her eyes adjust. 

It occurred to her that the device was much bigger than it need to be. With the light shining as brightly as it did now, she could tell that most of the interior was made up of empty space. The light source itself was small, at it's core. The intricate metallic decal along the outside made it look strangely like a minature prison. She could almost _feel_ the thing trapped inside calling out to her. She was reminded strongly of the unseen infant in her dream and the ache in her stomach grew. She resisted an irrational urge to crack the holo the way she might a geode or an egg, to release the thing inside. If Luke was right about the holos being alive...

Suddenly chimes rang out, it was a signal the entire village had been waiting for: Everyone emerged from the huts beneath the trees and began to walk towards a large opening under an outcropping of stone that rose up very near the base of the mountain. 

The mountain caves were considered a sacred refuge by the people of the valley. The general population only entered by special invitation, or under extreme need. Even the food the villagers had harvested before windfall could only be carried inside by the priests. The High Priest had explained the custom, in High Avan dialect Leia could only partly understand, as soon as she'd entered their village. He'd also given her a formal pardon after she'd helped them collect the harvest. Leia was grateful for this, not only because it relieved her of some of the guilt she carried but also because she knew she would need the good will of these people if she ever had a hope of calling this world "home." 

She stuffed the holo back in her satchel, slung it over her shoulder, and nudged Luke lightly with her foot. 

“Come on Luke, we need to move the ships.”

Luke shot up, bleary eyed, but he followed obediently. 

With the villagers and the ships inside the cavern was quite a snug fit, but no one was complaining while the wind howled outside. In fact, it seemed the people of the valley had turned the occasion into a kind of festival: there was plenty of food, the people were singing in their native language (a song that rose and fell rhythmically and rapidly, echoing against the walls of the cavern to drown out the sound of the wind, even R2 could follow along to the beat) and by the lights of their lanterns Leia saw that the walls on either side had been also been polished. Large stone and wood-carved statues lined the back of the hall, and behind them Leia caught a glimpse of silvery-grey ore veins.  
She pointed them out to Luke.

“These are what I saw inside, a whole lot of them!” 

Luke took a closer look. “They look kind of like circuit wires.” 

“You think so? I thought maybe the were for communication.” 

Luke smiled, “That's just what they look like to me.” He sat down heavily, still exhausted, but he looked over to her examining the lines with interest. “It's another mystery...”  
Then he caught sight of Leia's satchel and stared. Leia noticed and she handed the bag to him. The red holo surged with light at that very moment, illuminating his features with an eerie glow as he inspected it. Then he gasped. 

“What's wrong?” Leia asked.

“It's emitting dark energy!” He said, and dropped it back in the bag as if it really had burned him. “Oh, no no no no!” He wrung a hand through his hair, panting. “I'll never get it opened now...That thing couldn't have come from the Jedi Temple Library.” He said it as if it had been an accusation. “They would have never tolerated it, probably would have destroyed it if they knew it even existed.” He looked at the bag as if having the two different holos side by side was in an of itself a perversion. Gingerly he removed the blue and handed the satchel back to Leia as if trying to get as far away from it as possible. 

“Whats wrong with it? I don't understand.”

Luke sighed, “Something like that could only have been created by masters of the Dark Side of the Force. Which can only mean it's a Sith artifact. It's possible some historian paired with the Jedi's Holocron because it contains a record of the same period of galactic history. I could use it to corroborate the intelligence I found in the blue holo, but I'll never get it open.”

“Why not?” Leia almost wanted to laugh. This sounded like a solution, not a problem. “Luke, this is great! You're probably the only person in the galaxy who _can_ open it.”

Luke shook his head, and then hung it low as if defeated. “I made a promise to myself to not reach out with the Dark Side...and I think that is what it would take to open this.”  
He looked up again, his face wore an almost tortured expression. 

Leia thought this reaction was ridiculous. She didn't consider herself the most spiritual person, but even she could recognize the difference between values and principles. From a young age, she'd known that values were malleable: a set of rules that worked in one situation may not make much sense in another. That was how she could lie straight up to the faces of Imperial Officers during the war, that was how she could withstand torture and still consider her self a woman of honesty and integrity. The situation demanded she adapt her values, put the principles from which they originated remained constant. 

She wanted to explain all of this to Luke, but when she opened her mouth she was surprised to find something completely different come out: 

“Then...teach me to do it.” She offered. 

There was silence, and she suddenly felt ashamed. As if she had mentioned something obscene. 

On the day they'd left Endor, she'd made him promise not to tell anyone in the fledgling New Republic that they shared the same biological parents. In her mind it was just common sense; especially since Luke was being so damned proud and would tell anyone _(anyone who would listen!)_ who his father was.

People on one side of the political spectrum already wanted her dead, she just wanted to make sure the other side actually had her back. 

She knew that request had hurt Luke, but ultimately he understood the necessity for it. Since then, they'd only ever referred to their relationship in private (Barring Han, of course.) Referring to it aloud, however obscurely, and even if most of the people around them couldn't understand what they were saying, was like finally admitting to herself the full implications of what it meant to be a full-blooded sibling to Luke Skywalker. She'd always felt a kinship with Luke, even before she knew, but she'd never felt anything, _anything,_ but complete and utter revulsion for his-- No...for _**their** father. _

Luke recognized the admission for what it was. She saw his face transition through a range of emotions: surprise, confusion, pity, suspicion, conflict...and finally amusement. 

“I could teach you,” he admitted, “but not while you're on your honeymoon that would be too much of a distraction.” 

She laughed, and this time the ache in her belly sunk deeper. Shrinking, almost disappearing entirely, as she did so.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's been a month since I uploaded Chapter 1. I was hoping to get all ten chapters of "Act I" up by today, but it just felt so right to have Leia ask for training now...and because of that I have to edit my outline a bit. Luke's not quite ready to be a teacher, and having Leia as his first student has got to be pretty intimidating for him.


End file.
